


In Her Eyes

by anotherlongstoryshort



Series: Impressions [1]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Angst, BAMF Kirk, Gen, Hurt Jim, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Kid Jim, Missing Scenes, Mothers aren't perfect, Neither are sons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-25
Updated: 2016-02-25
Packaged: 2018-05-23 01:43:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6100717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anotherlongstoryshort/pseuds/anotherlongstoryshort
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A mother is supposed to scare away the nightmares of her children. This is infinitely more difficult when she can't seem to fight off her own.</p><p>James Tiberius Kirk is just one day old and Winona can't stop crying.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first foray into writing Star Trek fic.
> 
> I was curious as to what might have led Jim Kirk to that fateful meeting in a bar in Riverside. What happened between the Kelvin and the Enterprise?

James Tiberius Kirk is just one day old and Winona can't stop crying. 

 

She had screamed when the nurses first tried to take him away. He was all she had left she told them, babbling hysterically and wailing until they sedated her. 

It was nonsense, of course. She still had Sam. She still had her family, both in and outwith Starfleet. She wasn't alone. 

But that tiny little baby was the last piece of himself that George left behind. 

So when Winona woke and the tears welled up again, silent and exhausted this time around, she forced herself from the biobed to reach for him in his incubated cot. 

"Hi, Jim." she whispered, voice wavering. "I'm here, baby." 

 

* * *

 

James 'Let's call him Jim' Kirk is three and he has his father's eyes. 

 

They still sometimes caught Winona unawares. 

Jim would trip or bump his head and they would fill with tears. She would hug him and try not to look, to acknowledge the way her breath caught for just a second. 

He would wake from a nightmare and they would be huge, wide and terrified in a pale face.  

And as she made hot milk and told Sam to go back to sleep, she tried and failed to stop herself from wondering if George had looked like that before... 

   
 

* * *

 

Jimmy Kirk is seven and Winona can't stay. 

 

The 'fleet had given her extended leave after the Kelvin and allowed her to work solely in the shipyard after that. 

The work was good, engaging. Engineering could be done anywhere. But Winona missed the stars and keeping her feet on the ground was driving her insane. 

At least, that's what she told herself when big blue eyes pleaded with her not to go. 

She told herself as she handed Jimmy off to his brother that this was about work. That it had nothing to do with the ghosts in her house, in their faces. 

It wasn't about Sam's quiet grief. It wasn't about Jimmy's constant questions. It wasn't about George. 

It wasn't. 

 

* * *

 

Jimmy, her Jimmy, is nine and too afraid, too angry. 

 

They had called about the car, local police making noises about juvenile detention. By the time she had landed on terra firma, it was doctors and social workers who lit up her comm. 

That bastard. That  _bastard_. 

Frank better hope to high heaven that they arrested him and that it happened before she tracked him down. 

Broken bones, healed over and resnapped. Bruises and burns and a  _goddamn suicide attempt._  

Sam had called, sobbing. ("I left. I didn't know and I left. I'm sorry.") 

Winona couldn't even be angry with him because, well, he'd just followed her example, hadn't he? And Jimmy had flinched from her when she finally got to the hospital. 

He was afraid she'd be angry about his dad's car. Afraid that she would take Frank's side. She had retreated to the nearest bathroom and thrown up until there was nothing left. 

She couldn't be a mother to him. Not after this, after her neglect, her  _failure_. What good was a mother to him if she couldn't keep him safe? 

Sam had been staying with a friend's family. They were happy for that to continue. ("Of course, Winona! Your work is so important, we understand...") 

For Jimmy, she had called her sister, Naria. She had a husband and a home and her children were happy. 

Tarsus IV would be good for him. 

 

* * *

 

Jim T. Kirk is eleven and Winona startles when she hears him laugh. 

 

Naria made sure he called every two weeks. Not always on time or with anything new to say, but he always called and Winona always listened. 

His smile radiated out from every hologram, even that pale imitation of the real Kirk grin warming her heart and assuring her that yes, this time, she had done the right thing. 

Jim was happy and Winona was overjoyed and so, so grateful. 

Her sister's family were good for him. They had given him a home that she never could. That was worth a million antique cars, even if it meant stamping down on the guilt of leaving him behind.  

Even if it meant silencing the jealousy that she hadn't been the one to make him seem whole again. 

Even if it meant telling herself not to worry when the calls stopped.  

 

* * *

 

J.T. is fourteen and he is  _alive_. 

 

Winona couldn't tear her eyes away from him, an emaciated pile of muscle and bone, taut fury in every sharp edge of his limbs. 

He wouldn't talk to her, except to snarl. He didn't answer to Jimmy anymore. Or Jim or James. 

No one could even tell her what he'd been through. Their family had been murdered, Jim had escaped and the rest was... 

Blank. 

The doctors catalogued his injuries, told him he was lucky. Winona was almost glad when he stabbed one with their own pen. 

He had only spoken to the Starfleet officers who had extracted the survivors. (Nine people, just  _nine_ , oh god.) He had only done that to spare the others the indignity. And now his words were buried under levels of 'classified' that his mother could never hope to access. 

If it hadn't been for that one name from the landing party. First Officer Christopher Pike. The polite man who had interviewed her for his dissertation. Tactful, kind and he owed her a favour, as far as Winona was concerned. 

She read the file by Jim's bed while he slept, kept under by a heady cocktail of drugs. She read of the horrors and atrocities carried out by order of a man history would remember as Kodos the Executioner. 

And she read about Jim ( _Her_   _Jim, Jimmy, James, J.T._ ) and all he had done. All he had sacrificed, just to survive and keep the few he could breathing. It was awful and heartbreaking and she was  _proud_. 

He was a hero and nothing like his father. He made it out alive. 

 

* * *

 

Jim is sixteen and Winona doesn't know what to do. 

 

Starfleet was behind her now. She wouldn't choose them over her son again. They had moved back to Earth, to a new house for new memories. 

She had hoped they could make it work. 

At least twice a month, she got a call. From the police, from a disgruntled bartender, from the hospital. 

Jim drank and fought and lied. He smoked weed and hacked public services to manipulate charges, get fake IDs and find places he could go to get hit and hit back. 

Winona bailed him out every time. The perks of the private sector. But she didn't know how to help him or even if he could be helped. 

She thought maybe she had been wrong. Her Jimmy wasn't here anymore. Maybe he did die on that godforsaken colony. 

The boy wearing his face was little more than a ghost. A vengeful spirit, turned to stone to keep the universe from breaking him. 

When he announced he was leaving, she didn't have the heart to ask him to stay. 

 

* * *

 

Kirk James is nineteen and he looks more like George every day. 

 

Winona regrets the thought as soon as she has it and smiles at the teenager pulling a face at her over the holo. 

He looks more like  _himself_  every day. 

The postcards had started arriving about a year after he rode out of Iowa on a labour transport. Blank at first. Then ' _I'm sorry_ ' and ' _you did what you could. I get that now_ '. 

She had called in sick the morning that arrived, unable to stop shaking. 

The next she heard was a nurse calling from Australia, letting her know that a Mr. James had her listed as his emergency contact and had been involved in a rock climbing accident. 

Jim called himself the next day to explain that he preferred not to tell people his name. Just in case. 

Lately he had been in one place long enough to rent an apartment and have access to proper comm and holo equipment. He called every two weeks. 

This time, when the calls stopped, she really didn't worry.


	2. Chapter 2

James T. Kirk is twenty-two and Winona can't believe her eyes. 

 

She couldn't believe her boy (who was certainly not a boy anymore) was  _here_. 

He shifted the tattered backpack on his shoulders awkwardly, hovering on the front porch like he had no right to be there. "... hey, mom." 

"Jimmy." she breathed and he barely had the time to tense up before she had her arms around him, hugging him to her as tight as she could. " _Jimmy._ " 

It took him just a moment too long to relax, to huff a laugh and pat her on the back. 

"Been a while since anyone called me that." 

"Yes, right, of course." Winona backed up, wiping her eyes with her sleeve. Jim smiled at her, a mischievous grin she hadn't seen in far too long and she had to resist lunging for him again. "It's just Kirk, now, right?" 

The smile faltered, only a little, and his eyes softened. "Jimmy's just fine." 

Winona beamed and stepped aside to usher him through the doorway. "Come in, come in. Are you hungry? I don't have much in the kitchen but I can always..." 

She trailed off awkwardly, not wanting to press food as an issue and brought up short by the way her son filled the room. He had gotten so tall, any wiryness from his teenage years far behind him. His shoulders were broad, his back straight and he looked around the unfamiliar space with nothing more sinister than curiosity. 

He seemed... Not happy, exactly. Nor totally unburdened. But he was lighter, more confident. His mouth twitched upward instead of down. 

Those eyes, as bright and blue as the first time he'd opened them, paused on the collection of hanging pictures that led up the narrow staircase. George, Sam, Naira... 

"So what brings you to Riverside?" Winona tried, desperate to sound light and casual. "Last I heard, you were still in Europe." 

"Yeah, got back stateside about a month ago." Jim wrenched his gaze back around to her. "Had a gig with a transporter fleet. Small time, fixing up the engines and stuff, y'know?" He plucked an apple from the fruit bowl and polished it on his shirt. "But I jumped off in Hawkeye day before last and figured I should probably say hi." 

"I'm glad you did." 

He shrugged off the gratitude and took a bite from the fruit. The ease of the action made something in Winona relax, soothing a fear she didn't even know she still carried. 

"… do you still drink coffee?" 

Jim grinned and finally sat down, sliding his bag onto the floor. "Only when it can't be supplied intravenously." 

His mother rolled her eyes and went through the motions of making a pot. She couldn't stand the replicated stuff, it all just tasted like metal shavings. The routine settled her and once her nerves calmed down, she took a breath and asked what she always had to. 

"How long are you staying?" 

Jim hummed, stretching out the kinks from a long drive. "Not sure. However long I can cover a motel bill, I guess." 

"Don't be ridiculous." Winona chided. "I have a guest room. You're welcome to it for as long as you want." 

Silence greeted her and when she turned around the sheer surprise on Jim's face broke her heart. He recovered quickly, in a quirk of the head and a constructed smile. 

"Awesome. Guess I'll just see what happens, then." 

It took less than two days for him to become restless. Winona may have cut back to part time work but she was still out of the house for half the day. In the time left to himself, Jim tidied the garden, retiled the roof, fixed up the older pieces of furniture and tinkered with any piece of tech he could get his hands on. He even dragged out Sam's old motorcycle and got it running again. 

"I  _am_  an engineer, you know." She reminded him, cooking dinner while he typed furiously on her PADD. "I'm perfectly capable of updating things myself." 

"But where's the fun in that?" Jim grinned at her and she couldn't help but return the gesture. "Besides, you don't have to prove your tech skills to me. I'm more concerned with the fact you can apparently cook now." 

He snorted when her tea towel hit his face. 

"I took a class." Winona informed him, cheeks pink. "My... Well, my therapist thought it would be a good idea." 

The humour faded and he put the PADD down, watching her with far too knowing eyes. 

"I didn't know you were..." 

"It was high time." she interrupted. "I was... tired, Jimmy. Of running from..." She met his eyes briefly and swallowed. "Everything." 

He was weighing her words, she could tell. She hoped he could hear the apology in there. Either way, it was a real smile that graced his features. 

"Good for you, mom. Really." 

"Thank you." 

They passed in companionable silence until she joined him at the table and he slid his new coding over to her. Winona read it slowly, eating her meal while she assessed the program and what it would do. Essentially, it rerouted energy usage in a much more efficient manner, not only making the dang thing work faster but probably last twice as long too. It was type of code her company would spend months developing. 

"… you could make a fortune with your brains, you know that?" 

Jim paused with a forkful of pasta halfway to his mouth. He looked away before resuming the motion. 

"What do I need with money? I get by okay." 

Winona sighed. "Is okay really enough for you?" 

"I really don't want another lecture about wasted potential right now." Jim told her quietly and there was a thin strain of anger or frustration or something else entirely under his words. "Please." 

And because it wasn't her place anymore, Winona dropped it. 

"… I have to be up early tomorrow. Lots of boring meetings. You should go out tonight, be with people your own age since I won't be around to disturb your hangover." 

And just like that, Jim was smiling again. "Is there still a no girls in my room rule?" 

"Absolutely." 

"How about boys?" 

" _Jim._ " 

It was later, when he'd said his goodbyes and sauntered off toward the stretch of bars and clubs that serviced the shipyard area, that she considered the message delivered to her comm the day before. 

 _'Winona. Hope you're doing okay. I'm in your neck of the woods tomorrow to pick up some recruits. Any chance you're free for a drink? Chris.'_  

Only a brief moment of hesitation delayed her response. 

 _'Sorry, Chris. Very busy this week. You should go out, get to know your new students. We can catch up next month. Winona._  

 _p.s. The Starlight is very popular and they stock that expensive crap you call brandy.'_  

There, she thought, with no little satisfaction. It was out of her hands. 

The rest was up to the universe. 


End file.
